NPR Story: Archeologists Race Against Time In Warming Arctic Coasts

Archeologists who study the people who lived in the Arctic thousands of years ago are in a race against time. Coastal settlements are being washed away by erosion, storm surges and other climate changes related to global warming. Clues to the past that were frozen intact in permafrost for thousands of years are melting and being destroyed by the elements. Archeologists are looking to climate scientists to predict where the erosion will be the fastest so they can pinpoint their research on the places that will disappear the soonest. Until now the predictions have largely been too coarse to provide much guidance. But the National Park Service is trying to change this. It’s funding research that supposed to forecast the threats that more than 100 coastal national parks face from sea level rise and storm surges due to climate change.

Hear the radio broadcast, which features PSU’s Dr. Shelby Anderson, here: